Is Trump finally running out of road?

Donald Trump faced growing pressure from Republicans on Sunday to drop his chaotic, last-ditch fight to overturn the US presidential election, as victor Joe Biden prepared to start naming his cabinet and a Pennsylvania judge compared Trump’s legal case there to “Frankenstein’s monster”.

Despite Republican leadership in Washington standing behind the president’s claims that the 3 November election was stolen from him by nationwide voter fraud, other prominent figures, including two of his former national security advisers, were blunt.

So, in other words, no, Trump is still marching up that road with Republican “leadership” right beside him. John Bolton said things on tv, but who cares.

And another former Trump administration national security

Well whaddya know, Tory equality commissioner has a Tory idea of what equality is.

(Spoiler: it’s to stop whining and find some way to “circumvent” the obstacles that discrimination puts in place.)

Jessica Butcher, a successful digital entrepreneur, was last week appointed as one of four new commissioners at the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) by Liz Truss, the minister for women and equalities.

The EHRC’s role is to enforce the Equality Act, Britain’s key equality law, and to reduce inequality and tackle discrimination. Commissioners help set the body’s strategic direction.

But in a series of speeches, interviews and articles, Butcher – who describes herself as an “old-school feminist” – has criticised many recent feminist campaigns, including on

People are enjoying the smackdown.

Judge laughs Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani out of court, dismisses case with prejudice, “DENIED AS MOOT” https://t.co/DBoN8XzHVF

— Palmer Report (@PalmerReport) November 22, 2020

https://twitter.com/rumpfshaker/status/1330303129859055616

SOMEbody is not so happy.

The Media is just as corrupt as the Election itself!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 21, 2020

… Read the rest

Judge smacks Trump down hard.

A US District Court judge Saturday dismissed a lawsuit by the Trump campaign trying to invalidate millions of Pennsylvania mail-in votes.

“Plaintiffs ask this Court to disenfranchise almost seven million voters. This Court has been unable to find any case in which a plaintiff has sought such a drastic remedy in the context of an election, in terms of the sheer volume of votes asked to be invalidated,” US District Court Judge Matthew Brann wrote Saturday.

Plus, the case is crap.

“One might expect that when seeking such a startling outcome, a plaintiff would come formidably armed with compelling legal arguments and factual proof of rampant corruption, such that this Court would have no

How to do better at pronouning.

Yes! That’s so important! Always get into the habit of interrupting people to tell them what to say. Life is drab and tedious without that.

What a fun afternoon that sounds like.

What if my authentic self is someone who doesn’t believe in specialty pronouns?… Read the rest

There’s another one of those Open Letters, this one from “the LGBTQ+ community” of Ireland.

For decades the transgender community has advocated, marched, and fought for equality, and inclusion. This fight has never once wavered in supporting movements that garner equality for all marginalised communities.

Well that’s a lie. “The trans community” doesn’t advocate or fight for all marginalized communities, it advocates and fights for its own. Individual trans people may have joined in, but the “community” has not, and it has gone way out of its way to shit on women.

Our work, our fight, our campaigns, have all been underscored by two things, intersectionality and solidarity. The transgender community has always worked in advancing the equal rights

Katherine Morgan says it’s white women’s fault:

The 2016 exit polls reported that 52 percent of white women had voted for Trump, though according to TIME, that number was closer to 47 percent.

…

The bookstore where I worked was similarly hectic in June: We received countless anti-racism book orders. And yet, despite all of the learning that supposedly took place via these books, in early November 2020 exit polls stated that among white women, Trump still held their support: An estimated 55 percent of white women voted for Trump. This is at least a two-point increase for this demographic since the previous election. As I sit with this number—more than half—I think about how one

Trump is SULking, na na na na nah.

Used to was, we couldn’t get away from him.

The outgoing US president held endless campaign rallies, verbally sparred with reporters on the way to his helicopter and spent so long on the phone to Fox News shows that even pliable hosts had to gently but firmly hang up.

He’s that guy. He’s that guy who never shuts up, that guy who has no interest in anyone else, that guy who thinks his every word is enthralling.

But now he’s hiding.

For critics, it is evidence of a monumental sulk as Trump contemplates his imminent loss of power and exit from the White House. In their view, it is also a

Remember those two Michigan Republican legislators who visited Trump yesterday? One of whom sang a hymn rather than answer a reporter’s questions at the airport?

It seems they had a fun party at Trump’s hotel last night.

Two different Americas.

LEFT: Americans on food lines in Texas.
RIGHT: Michigan legislators at Trump Hotel drinking Dom Perignon pic.twitter.com/cSVoU5WyAY

— Mr. Newberger (@jeremynewberger) November 21, 2020

Also…

I spotted Michigan GOP legislators Mike Shirkey & Dan Lauwers leaving Trump Hotel this morning w/ staff, the morning after their meeting with Trump @ White House. They did not respond to my questions shouted from behind a security barrier and left in a black SUV for airport pic.twitter.com/UF2sPLSlQG

— Melissa Nann Burke (@nannburke) November

More of the same pious mindless glurge.

Trans rights are human rights, and your fight is our fight too.

The Labour Party stands proudly with the trans community. #TDoR2020 pic.twitter.com/BsMI6RsIWq

— Angela Rayner (@AngelaRayner) November 20, 2020

“Everyone should be able to love themselves and be loved for who they are,” she says earnestly. Really? Is that true? No. Should Trump be loved for who he is? No. Should he be able to love himself for who he is? No.

Funny how feminism never claimed this. Funny how no human rights struggle claimed this, until the trans hyperbole train rolled into the station. There is no Right to be Loved (except possibly children’s right to parental love). Human rights aren’t … Read the rest

From Brenda is a Sheep to Beatrix Potter’s Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck, courtesy of Project Gutenberg:

Listen to the story of Jemima Puddle-duck, who was annoyed because the farmer’s wife would not let her hatch her own eggs.

Her sister-in-law, Mrs. Rebeccah Puddle-duck, was perfectly willing to leave the hatching to some one else—”I have not the patience to sit on a nest for twenty-eight days; and no more have you, Jemima. You would let them go cold; you know you would!”

“I wish to hatch my own eggs; I will hatch them all by myself,” quacked Jemima Puddle-duck.

So she went into the woods to do so.

Jemima alighted rather heavily, and began to waddle about in search

Michigan Senator thinks he doesn’t have to answer questions.

This morning, I asked @SenMikeShirkey if he would honor the will of Michigan voters in his meeting with Trump today. He responded by singing a hymn about being persecuted: pic.twitter.com/IQRXokq9F2

— Lauren Windsor (@lawindsor) November 20, 2020

She’s not joking; he really did that.… Read the rest

Originally a comment by Screechy Monkey on He knows he lost but.

“Legitimate” is a tricky word — it means a lot of different things to different people. Regardless of how political scientists might define it, the average voter might mean any of the following:

1. “I understand that it is the will of the people that X is going to be president, and under our system he’s entitled to assume the office, but I consider him unworthy and therefore don’t personally think he is a ‘real’ president.”

2. “I understand that X ‘won’ the election under the rules in place (the Electoral College), and under our system he’s entitled to assume the office, but I consider those rules … Read the rest

Georgia certifies the vote, dragging its feet and kicking and screaming.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp said Friday that [he] will “follow the law” and sign the paperwork that officially grants the state’s 16 electoral votes to President-elect Joe Biden.

Well, nice of him not to announce that he will break the law, I guess.

State law requires Kemp, a Republican, to award Georgia’s electoral votes to the certified winner of the presidential election. A federal judge on Thursday rejected a last-ditch lawsuit that tried to block certification, and Biden’s victory was certified Friday afternoon by Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.

Friday afternoon eastern time – so the GSA should be able to certify the election and release … Read the rest

More crazy with every day.

[I]nstead of softening or coming to terms with his defeat, a reclusive Trump has been escalating his dark and corrosive efforts to undercut American democracy. As his legal options fizzle and some aides seek to convince him to come to grips with reality, Trump has only entrenched deeper into debunked conspiracy theories.

…

Trump’s aims seem scattershot. He has told some allies that he knows he lost. But he has also admitted to at least one interlocutor that he is delaying the transition process — and aggressively trying to sow doubt in the election — as retribution for Democrats who questioned the legitimacy of his own election in 2016.

Instead of searching for

As the coup attempt continues –

Two Republican senators, Utah’s Mitt Romney and Nebraska’s Ben Sasse, have added their voices to the growing chorus of disapproval – admittedly mainly coming from Democrats, as many Trump loyalists keep their counsel – toward the White House’s continued efforts to question or overturn the election results that will leave Donald Trump as a one-term, impeached president who is under criminal investigation, Edward Helmore and Joanna Walters write from New York.

pic.twitter.com/S3kFsIRGmi

— Mitt Romney (@MittRomney) November 20, 2020

Sasse focused his attention on Rudy Giuliani, the Trump loyalist-lawyer who held a bizarre press conference on Thursday during which he presented a list of far-fetched claims about voter fraud in the 2020 election.

“Rudy

I’ve been seeing a lot of talk in the past few days about a children’s book called Brenda is a Sheep. The book won a book award.

Amy Sousa reads along and discusses the story:

Scottish Book Trust announced that P1s across Scotland are putting the book "Brenda is a Sheep" in their Family Bags.

The book teaches kids that despite clear evidence, they should stop trusting their intuitions, & instincts.

Part 1 analyzes the book:https://t.co/JwPIUW7es7

— Amy E. Sousa (@KnownHeretic) November 19, 2020

Her video is entertaining as well as instructive.

The book itself is ridiculously confusing. It’s a sort of Little Red Riding Hood turned on its head, but…what? What’s her point? That wolves, however hungry … Read the rest

Lindsey Graham appears to have committed a felony.

On Monday, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger—who, like Graham, is a Republican—told the Washington Post that Graham asked him if he could throw out all mail ballots from counties with a high rate of signature mismatch. Raffensperger later clarified that he believed Graham wanted his office to throw out valid, legally cast ballots. The senator has contested this account.

Graham’s alleged request is unseemly and corrupt. But is it criminal? In short, yes, according to multiple Georgia election law experts. If Raffensperger’s account is true, there is virtually no doubt that Graham committed a crime under Georgia law.

But nothing will happen to him as a result.

It might

Something to keep in mind as you eat your grilled chicken breast:

Supervisors at an Iowa Tyson Foods, a major US meat processor, placed bets on how many workers would become infected with coronavirus as an outbreak raged through the plant this spring, a wrongful death suit alleges.

The lawsuit, filed this week by the son of an employee who died with Covid-19, claims the company demonstrated “wanton disregard for worker safety”.

Isidro Fernandez, who died in April, was one of more than 1,000 workers infected amid the plant’s outbreak.

Meatpackers are notoriously terrible at worker safety. The company said it was ever so upset to hear it, but I don’t believe them. As I said – meatpackers are horrendous … Read the rest

The Beeb is reading Obama’s memoir.

A Promised Land sold nearly 890,000 copies in the US and Canada in its first 24 hours – a record for publisher Penguin Random House. It is expected to become by far the biggest-selling presidential memoir in history.

Ahhh Trump’s not going to like that.

The Beeb dishes on what Obama thought of various counterparts. Putin?

Mr Obama said the Russian leader reminded him of the political barons he encountered during his early career in Chicago. He writes he was “like a ward [district] boss, except with nukes and a UN Security Council veto”.

He continues: “Putin did, in fact, remind me of the sorts of men who had once run the Chicago